Washington publishes some of the most detailed school discipline data in the country. The dashboards below let you explore suspension and expulsion rates by district, school, grade level, and student group. The same data underlies most of the research on this site.
OSPI Student Discipline Hub
ospi.k12.wa.us — Student Discipline
OSPI’s central resource for discipline data, policy documents, and guidance. Includes annual discipline data files (downloadable), district and school-level tables, and links to the WAC rules that govern reporting. Updated each fall for the prior school year.
What you can find here: Statewide totals and trends; district-level suspension and expulsion rates; breakdowns by offense type; data going back to 2011–12.
Washington State Report Card — Discipline
washingtonstatereportcard.ospi.k12.wa.us
The Report Card’s discipline section is the most accessible way to look up data for a specific district or school. Filter by student group to see disaggregated rates — including breakdowns by race and ethnicity, disability status, English learner status, foster care, homelessness, and more.
How to use it: Select “Discipline” from the navigation, then search for a district or school. Switch between “All Students” and specific student groups using the dropdown. Compare to state averages to identify gaps.
Disproportionate Impact Dashboard
OSPI / Washington State Report Card
Washington law requires districts to track and report disproportionate discipline by race and disability. The Report Card’s equity indicators show which districts have been flagged for significant disproportionality — a federal designation that triggers additional requirements under IDEA.
What “significant disproportionality” means: A district is flagged when students of a particular race are disciplined, removed, or placed in restrictive settings at rates substantially higher than peers. Federal law (IDEA § 618) requires flagged districts to set aside 15% of their IDEA funds for coordinated early intervening services.
How to Read the Data
Discipline data can be misleading without context. A few things to keep in mind when interpreting Washington’s numbers:
Rates, not counts
Always compare suspension rates (incidents per 100 students) rather than raw counts. A large district will always have more incidents than a small one. Rates allow meaningful comparisons across schools and districts of different sizes.
Short-term vs. long-term suspension
Washington data distinguishes between short-term suspensions (10 days or fewer) and long-term suspensions (more than 10 days). The 2016 and 2023 rule updates placed the strictest limits on long-term discipline. Watch for trends in each category separately.
Unduplicated vs. total incidents
OSPI reports both total incidents and unduplicated student counts. A student suspended three times in one year counts as three incidents but one unduplicated student. For understanding who is affected, use unduplicated student counts. For understanding overall volume, use total incidents.
Suppressed data
When a student group is very small (fewer than 10 students in most cases), OSPI suppresses the data to protect student privacy. Suppressed cells appear as “N/A” or asterisks. This is most common in small districts — but suppression can mask serious disparities in rural communities where individual student groups are small.